


Learning How To Die

by akamine_chan



Series: Learning How [2]
Category: due South
Genre: Community: ds_snippets, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-06-08
Updated: 2008-06-08
Packaged: 2017-10-15 18:08:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 288
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/163481
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akamine_chan/pseuds/akamine_chan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Age had not treated her well. Neither had a life on the run.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Learning How To Die

**Author's Note:**

> Unbeta'd. Title snagged from **_While I thought that I was learning how to live, I have been learning how to die. -Leonardo Da Vinci_**.
> 
> Prompts: end and
> 
>  _What it was that drove me here  
>  Well, a fifth of it was nerve  
> -Headstones, "Losing Control"_

Age had not treated her well. Neither had a life on the run.

The icy, ethereal loveliness that had stunned him when they'd first met was gone. Now, she looked older than her age, unflattering wrinkles and sagging skin. Hers was a beauty of youth and perfection and the vagaries of time had stolen that away. While other women gracefully accepted the signs of growing older, took a sense of pride in their crow's feet and gray hair, she had fought against it with every ounce of her being. And it was obvious that she had lost.

Ray was a reassuring presence next to him as Fraser looked at her wasted body, modestly covered with a hospital gown and a blue blanket. Ray had refused to let Fraser face her by himself, had refused to let go of his hand, had refused to let Fraser push him away. Ray had known how important this was to Fraser, for him to look at her and remain _unmoved_ by the love that once threatened his sanity.

An ordinary woman, vitality stolen away by disease and the burning abhorrence of everything she couldn't dominate. Fraser understood that now, after so many years of worrying at his memories of her. A passionate woman, driven by her hate and her desire in equal measure, wanting everything she couldn't have and trying to destroy everything she couldn't get.

Looking at her once beloved face, he sighed, squeezing Ray's hand tightly. Everything he'd felt for her, the love and fear, the fierce determination to save her from herself, the lust and pity, it was all gone, emptied out of his heart to make room for Ray. She was the past.

Ray was his future.

-fin-


End file.
